UX / UI Design - Sydney

Hello there! My name is Matty Schreck, and I’m the Head of Design here at Wisetech Global.

Hiring Designers to build a great Product Design team in Sydney is not easy. Neither is finding the right role with the right employer. So instead of boring you with yet another generic job description that looks just like any other out there, I want to talk you through what we’re planning, and what types of people we’d like us to join. And if by the end you think “I want to be part of this, and I have something to offer that will be useful”, then get in touch with us! And if you’re not quite sure, but you’re genuinely curious to learn more, get in touch with us, too.

About the company

WiseTech Global is on a mission to change the world by creating breakthrough products that empower those who own, enable, and operate the world's supply chains. We’re a global logistics software company with headquarters in Alexandria, Sydney. We’ve been listed on the ASX since 2016, and have almost 3,000 employees world wide, with many offices in 50+ countries.

We have a medium-sized Product Design team in Sydney’s Inner West that looks after our flagship product CargoWise. Global logistics as an industry vertical is very broad and very deep, and CargoWise covers many, many aspects of it, and we’re shipping many hundreds of improvements to the product every year. To enable and support all of this with a modern Product Design practice, we need to grow this team to several times its current size.

Our open roles:

Instead of worrying about a long list of bullet points that you might or might not be able to match exactly, have a look at the below list. And if you feel that your skillset falls into those broad categories, reach out to us:

Product Design at CargoWise (our main product):

• Mid-level or higher User Interface Designer:

  Helps business units by taking on requests of varying sizes, from icon design to fully fledged user flows; strongly collaborates with the Design System on bringing modern UI designs to the whole business

• Mid-level or higher User Experience Designer:

  Firmly embedded in a business unit for a longer term, working on all design-related tasks in that area; working on UX-related projects end-to-end; utilising our Design System to create cohesive user experiences

• Mid-level or higher Content Designer:

  See “Design specialisations we’re looking to establish” for more details

• About Junior / Associate / Graduate Designers:

  Getting embedded in a business unit as the first Designer ever takes resilience, confidence, and experience. There will be a time soon when our team is established enough in the company, and senior enough in experience, to take on less experienced Designers and provide them with a constructive learning environment. However, we are not quite there yet. Please see this as a “Not right now” and not a “Not ever” - I’m a big believer in a strong team mix of all experience levels, and when the time is right, this paragraph here will be removed.

WiseTech Academy (our new online learning portal):

• Senior User Interface Designer with some UX skills:

  establishes a visual identity for this new offering and creates an appropriate theme for this audience that stands alongside our Design System; solves user experience problems from end to end

• Mid-level or higher Content Designer:

  see “Design specialisations we’re looking to establish” for more details

Design Team responsibilities and structure:

We have implemented a hub-and-spoke structure to serve our main product, CargoWise:

• The hub is formed by the Design System team, and led by a Lead Designer who reports directly to me. We’re in the process of building out this Design System, and there are many unique challenges due to the complexity of the subject matter, and the strict B2B nature, and the criticality of the processes it needs to support. There’s plenty to do for UI Designers who want to break new ground.
• The spokes in this model are made up of embedded Designers who are placed into business units for longer periods of time. These are usually Designers with a focus on UX and user research, who over time, learn the subject matter of the business units from the subject matter experts they’re working with.
• There are diverse challenges to tackle, and we try to match Designers and their strengths and interests to the appropriate types of challenges we anticipate. The subject matter for each of those units can touch everything global logistics has to offer: container boom gates management, warehouse scanning dashboards, international accounting standards, data integrity, containers travelling on ships, planes, trucks, and so on.
• Embedded Designers integrate themselves into existing workflows with help from our Design Leadership. They educate their cross-functional peers on the value of modern Product Design, and gain their trust through great collaboration skills and the high quality of the work outcomes they provide.
• Some of our business units have not worked with Designers before, so we’re looking for Design pioneers who love changing hearts and minds, and pursue outcomes pragmatically, rather than sticking to processes too rigidly. We’re trying to introduce changes from the bottom up, rather than mandating them from the top down. We need strong and curious UX Designers who can help us with that.
• Hub and spokes work together to resolve difficult interaction problems. This is a win-win: embedded UX Designers have access to UI Designers, while the Design System team learns of real-world challenges their system needs to tackle.

What makes our Design Team different:

A week as a Designer on our team usually starts with a Design Collaboration session. After sharing how our weekends have been and what this week has in store for us, Designers can present PROBLEMS they’re currently trying to solve. Other Designers can then volunteer to assist, and we might run a workshop or two to provide new ideas and approaches for the Designer in need.

Every second Tuesday afternoon (only when we’re in the office), we have a Sharing is Caring session: any Designer who has something interesting to tell about a specific Design topic can present. These are often research findings, or thoughts on processes, or discoveries within our products.

Later in the week, we have our Design Critique session. Every Designer showcases the SOLUTIONS they’ve been working on, and receives constructive feedback from all other Designers.

With this combination of rituals, all Designers have full access to the whole Design group on a regular basis, regardless of where they’re embedded. This helps with projects, but also provides learning opportunities from others in the team.

Additionally, every Designer has a weekly 1:1 with their manager (currently me in most cases) to get continuous constructive feedback, talk about the challenges they tackle, receive coaching, etc.

We round out our week with our Week-end Wind-Down, which is strictly social and has been known to include silly drawing games and quizzes like “Whose fridge is this anyway?”.

Currently we meet, in person, one day per fortnight at our Head Office in Alexandria, Sydney, allowing for stronger collaboration across our team. However, anybody is welcome to come to the office more often than that.

Design specialisations we’re looking to establish:

There are a number of tasks that we’re currently covering as a Design team in our projects, that would benefit from specialists. The time is not yet right to establish all of them at once, so right now, we’re focusing on:

• Content Design:

  WiseTech Global already has various Content teams in place, mainly dealing with learning and education materials. We need a Content Designer who can help across the Design team with UI-related pieces of text from labels to tooltips, help text, empty-states and much more. Initially, such a role would support the whole team, including the writing of Design System guidelines, but once the Design team scales, Content Designer placements would become more specialised in specific subject matters.

Get in touch

We hope that all of this has made you curious! As the Head of Design, I’m always happy to grab a virtual coffee and hop on a MS Teams call to tell you about the great opportunities we have for you. These chats are strictly-no-strings-attached, I’m always just glad to meet new people and can’t wait to meet you. Hopefully speak to you soon!

Before you apply

From time to time, WiseTech Global may use external service providers to assist us with assessing applications, including background checks, on our behalf. Accordingly, by applying for this role and providing your personal information to WiseTech Global, you consent to WiseTech Global providing this information to our external service providers who are required to treat such information with strict confidentiality in line with privacy and data protection laws and regulations.